22 Months

Well I think the "terrible two's" have started a few months early in our house. Ben is very opinionated and very impatient. His time-out chair has been getting some use the past few week. I am so not a fan of this phase at all! But on the other hand I also have a loving, smart, funny and very polite 22 month old! It is just amazing how much he learns daily. I can ask him to go do or get something and he actually understands me and does it! He never stops chatting! And now he is stringing more and more words together. Love you is one of the best things I have heard out of his mouth since he said Mama. He has only said it twice but it was heart melting! He always has a car or truck in his hand. They go everywhere with him-in the car, into stores and in his crib. It is one of the first things we hear in the morning...him "driving" his car along his crib saying "go car go vroom". Ben is still eating like a bird. It is so frustrating! We make him 3 nice meals a day and he hardly eats. But then he will sit down and eat an adult serving size out of the blue. Snacks are even hard to get him to eat. I am hoping he goes back to being a good eater soon. Still no juice or milk just water.

 He hit a big milestone this week...he has over 100 words in his vocabulary!


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A Birthday & Horses

Saturday was our niece Sierra's 8th birthday! She had a great party out at Sunset Stables in Lee's Summit. We were so excited and had Ben saying horse and neigh neigh. and we were so excited for the party! When we got there Ben was so excited to see the all the horses!  The birthday party had close to 30 kids so they divided them all into 3 groups. One group would play games, the next would groom and paint horses and the last would take a horse ride and everyone would rotate until they had done everything. Ben was a bit young for the games and the horse grooming and painting so we mainly explored the grounds and petted horses! When it came to our groups horse ride turn everyone was so excited! Sierra jumped right on and and they took off! Ben on the other hand started crying the minute we put the helmet on him and when we put him on the horse it was full force screaming...Mommy Mooommmmyy. Poor kid was terrified. So I guess we have found something the kid is afraid of! The rest of the party was full of food, cake, presents! Thanks to J, Stef and Sierra for inviting us to such a great birthday party!

1st Day of School (Moms Day Out)

Wednesday was Ben's 1st day back to school! He is at a new school this year-Rolling Hills!  It was a hard hard hard decision to switch schools but in the end we thought that it would be best. We will  miss Ms Karen at Hillcrest for sure-but their program starts at 12 months and Rolling Hills starts at 18 months. We wanted to ensure that Ben was in a class with kids very close to his own age and/or older. We all know there is a huge difference between a 12 month old and a 21 month old. So we left Hillcrest and started Rolling Hills for a few weeks this summer to try it out and have since decided to leave Ben at Rolling Hills. His new teachers Ms Lisa and Ms Amanda are great! And Ben really seems to love it! The first few weeks we had some tears at drop off but yesterday we were tear free-he didn't even need his B or Lovey!

iPhone Photo's

Staycation 2012

I'm about 3 weeks late posting but better late than never! Vince decided to take a few vacation days Mid-August and we decided we would have a little staycation in KC. We used some of Vince's hotel points and booked a room on the Plaza to kick it off right! My mom was gracious enough to offer to come to our house and watch Ben & Miles overnight for us! We checked into the hotel and then headed to grab a drink before dinner. We ended up at Houston's for drinks and dinner! So yummy! It was so nice to eat a whole meal uninterrupted by a toddler!

Then we headed to the movies and saw Ted. Both of us thought it was just ok. They gave away most of the super funny parts in the preview. After the movie we decided that since it was barely 10pm we couldn't be losers and go to the hotel and go to bed....so we went and sat on the roof at O'Dowds and enjoyed a night cap!

The next few days of our staycation wasn't as we had hoped or planned. Ben got sick. Miles got sick. Vince sold his old car. I got sick. Vince bought a new car. Vince got sick.

But on Saturday we did manage to sneak down to Garnett to visit the Katzer family! We had yet to see their new house and Angela said she was in desperate need of some Ben time! We walked in the door and within 3 minutes Angela was listening to Ben's lungs and then calling all three of us in z-packs. Despite being sick we had a great day trip! Kurt even took Ben out to see their cows! He had a BLAST! And it was a nice break for me & Vince since the Lakin, Paige & Reece were stuck to Ben like glue-we didn't have to do any toddler wrangling for a few hours! I think now that Ben is getting older his cousins are enjoying him even more!

We wrapped up the staycation with a McCormack Family Dinner on Sunday! It is always so nice to get everyone together for a few hours and catch up over Mom's good cooking!

21 Months

21 Months=3 Months until someones 2nd Birthday! This last month has flown by and it is a little bittersweet that my "baby" is going to be TWO in a few short months. Ben is still as high energy as ever-I have no idea where it all comes from since he eats like a bird. When he does sit down for a few minutes he loves to watch World Word. Miles is his absolute best friend-Ben can't stand to be away from him. If we are out and about he is asking me every 5 seconds where his Doggie is. Cars are still his favorite toys followed by his shopping cart and his latest obsession are cows. BaPa taught him how to "cheers" so you better watch your glass because he will cheers it whether you are holding it or not! He has learned to turn on Vince's car-its a push start and thankfully he can't reach the brakes yet so he can only get the radio to turn on! His vocab is still rapidly growing and he barely signs anymore. Water, ice, truck, outside, and cheers are a few of the more recent additions. He still calls most water bubbles except for his sippy which he now calls water (mostly). He can count...1-2-3. And normally when he starts counting you better run because he is getting ready to jump off of something. Seriously this kid has no fear. Vince and I swear we heard him say "love you mommy" after I told him I loved him but we haven't heard it since. But it melted my heart! Ben is a huge people person!  He says Hi to everyone he sees and gets pretty mad if people don't say Hi back to him. His bedtime is slowly getting later and later. He is normally in bed by 7:30 or 8 now unless he's super cranky and we will put him down at 7pm. I am really starting to like his one nap a day. He really sticks to the 12:30 pm nap schedule. By the end of lunch he is normally asking to go night-night. His toughest time of day is about 5pm when he gets super cranky while I am trying to get dinner started. It's almost impossible to get dinner cooked unless Vince is home. Ben is finally moving up to a size 5 diaper. He has been a 4 for over a year now. People keep telling me how big he is but he is only in the 40% for weight and height so it must be his head which is almost in the 90% that makes him look big. Ben had another 1st a few days ago...his first time on antibiotics. Poor guy came down with a upper respiratory infection (that he also shared with his mommy & da). He made it 21 months so I think that's pretty good. He was quite the funny man in our 21 month photo shoot so I added some funny outtakes this month!

A Boy & His Popsicle

Last week after another super hot day and a messy pasta dinner I thought a popsicle might be a nice treat. Ben had had a popsicle awhile back at GG & BaPa's but I had never given him one so I wasn't quite sure what to expect. We stripped him down and let him have it...and he loved it!